“Invite me up,” he says gruffly.
“You’re scaring me,” I murmur.
“What sort of man do you think I am?” He says in disgust.
I go to the lobby door and open it. He stands close by my side, but he doesn’t touch me. He’s so much his work persona now—the Chad, the grump—that I’m starting to wonder if I imagined the other version of him. He’s silent as I lead him up the stairs and into my apartment.
“Do you want a drink or anything?” I ask.
He makes a noise halfway betweennoand a grim laugh, like he thinks it’s hilarious I’d offer him anything after what I did.
“Sit,” he says bluntly.
His voice is a command. I sit on the couch, rubbing my hands up and down my legs nervously. His eyes flit to them, hunger flaring for a moment. Then he gives me an almost angry look that breaks my heart. It’s like he thinks I’m touching myself in an attempt to distract him, seduce him, even when it’s the last thing on my mind. I let my hands fall away.
He remains standing, his arms behind his back, as if I’m an employee he’s reprimanding. Wait, no. Notas if. That’s literally what I am.
“Tell me why you did it,” he says plainly. “You can lie to me if you want, but I’d prefer if you didn’t.”
“I’m not going to lie,” I whisper.
“Anymore,” he adds.
“I have lied,” I admit. “But I never planned on…”
“What?” he barks. “Stealing from me?”
“No,” I croak, a sob distorting the word. “On… us. I didn’t plan on that. I didn’t have a choice. No, that’s wrong. I had a choice. But it was an ugly, horrible choice. Aaron pretended to care about Grandma. Long enough to get her into a hospitalhewas paying for. Long enough for her to get settled. That’s when he told me what I had to do. Infiltrate your business. Steal from you. Facts, plans, records, whatever I could get my hands on.”
He nods slowly. “You weren’t doing this for money?”
I shake my head. “No. Not for me. It was all for my grandmother. I tried to hold off on giving him anything, but he threatened her. That’s how he knew about that politician, McLaughlin. And about… the records.” I squeeze my eyes shut, but the tears don’t care. They press hotly through my stubbornly closed eyelids. “I didn’t want to give him those, Dom. I swear. But he called the hospital and said he’d end their care. It was either give him the records or?—”
I stop, choking on a sob, when I realize he’s sat down and has pulled me into his arms. I don’t deserve the warmth that he offers, but I cling to him desperately anyway. This connection goes beyond the time we’ve spent together, beyond betrayal. It’s urgent and animalistic. It’s fiery heat battling away the cold of existence. It’s us.
“The records were fake,” he says.
I look up at him through tear-filled eyes.
He nods. “It’s a test I give to all new employees. A memory drive with supposedly sensitive information. You haven’t hurt my company, Songbird…” He swallows, like he’s annoyed with himself for using the nickname.
“I just hurt you,” I murmur.
That hardens him. He lets me go and sits back, sighing heavily. “I won’t sit idly by as Pike uses an innocent, sick elderly woman as a tool. I’ll pay for her care myself. I’ve already approved a higher status of health insurance for you, meaning she’ll be able to stay at her current facility under the new provider. This means you’ll need to technically stay on as an employee, but effectively, you’re fired.”
I shudder, nodding. What else did I expect?
His tone has gone ice-cold.
“I’ll reduce your salary to a nominal amount, enough to qualify for the insurance,” he grunts. “Otherwise, we’re done.”
“Thank you, oh, Dom, thank you,” I whimper. I reach over and cling to his hands. “And I’m so, so sorry.”
He holds my hands for half a minute, maybe more, staring at me with heartache in his eyes. He looks like he might cry too.
“I want to forgive you,” he says, his tone dark. “But I can’t trust you. I thought we had something. I thought it was real. Now, any time I look back, I’ll never know if you really wanted to be with me, or if it was all part of the plan.”
“Noneof it was part of the plan,” I hiss. “He didn’t tell me to be with you, Dom. That part was real. What we had in this apartment,just last night, that was real.”
